Answer:
This only turns over once you have traveled very far. What is it?
Long and think, red within, with a nail at the end.
I can be written, I can be spoken, I can be exposed, I can be broken.
I always run but never walk, I sometimes sing but cannot talk, No head on which a hat to place, You always look me in the face.
As a whole, I am both safe and secure. Behead me, I become a place of meeting. Behead me again, I am the partner of ready. Restore me, I become the domain of beasts.
What sphinxes employ and players enjoy.